Buildings

There’s security, and then there’s paranoia. The Safe House outside Warsaw, in Poland, appears to fall decisively into the latter category. It looks all bright and airy — almost Miesian, at first blush. But in an instant, the whole thing can mutate, Transformer-style, into an impenetrable concrete fortress that makes your local survivalist’s panic room look like a baby’s crib.

When I first saw the structure I thought it was interesting, I kept going back and forth between the pictures. I realized that this home is a fortress, completely armored home perfect to hold your ground against zombies. These are fully moveable walls operating on self sufficient mechanisms to keep the inhabitants from all exterior threat, and there are safe zones between the entrance and the main house that must be cleared with the right passcodes so you may enter. I don’t have a clue why someone would need a structure such as this in Poland but its damn cool, I wonder how much it cost to put in the machines that can move all these walls. And yes it has a retractable bridge, unless it had the Batcave right under it it couldn’t get any cooler.

I’m not one for the hut style house but I do love the landscaping and the outdoor area of the house. The design of the infinite pool is amazing with the ocean just over the hill. This is a very nice open air design which is free of clutter and has a very fresh feeling to it. The villa has 6 double bedrooms, 2 living rooms and 2 dining rooms and can accommodate up to 16 people. This would be a very nice beach house design but our temperature go a little bit to high for it to be open air. I especially like the lighting and the open spaces of it, it feels very relaxing and serene.

The project “is a perfect hideaway of absolute privacy and comfort. The main entrance features a covered walkway over a 2.000 square foot reflecting pool of black volcanic candistone. Lined with columns of white palimanan sandstone, the walkways lead to the East and West bedroom suites which flank the great room, the villa‘s central focal point. Construction followed a deliberate theme of rustic simplicity through the selection of natural materials such as sandstone, bamboo and Cristobal wooden doors and flooring. The result is a blend of casual elegance and comfortable luxury.”

The interior solution follows a functional space distribution, coinciding with the blocks’ intersections, over 3 floors. The different levels are connected by a series of flights of stairs, located on a fixed part of the building and ending on a beautiful glass floor corridor that connects with the upper level.

With 2000 square meters to work with A-Cero have design a modern marvel with this piece of architecture. The blocks forming and design making a very formidable building, but it still feels very fresh and open. With two master suites featuring their own walk-in closets and bathrooms, a gym, kitchen, solarium, an imposing living area, and a amazing terrace. Based on the design and materials of the house it looks to be built from expensive materials, then you could see the Beolab 5 Speakers sitting in the living room adding to the decoration and costing well over $15’000, so I’m assuming everything else is on the same level of quality and price.

This magnificent residence seems infiltrated in the ground with its asymmetrical volumes surfacing like a submarine. The home’s architecture is modern and diverse, offering unexpected angles of sight. Two amazing pools add color and entertainment to the overall project design. The building’s interiors take full advantage of the environment. Floor to ceiling windows allow unobstructed views of the ocean, while also ensuring a large amount of natural light during the day.

Rarely do I see house and think how the hell did they build it. It is a beautiful house built on a cliff with an amazing view, I haven’t been to Peru but I’m curious about going South America and there is a lot to see but this amazing design takes advantage of its location, I wouldn’t mind swimming in those pools during warm weather. The interior needs a little more work to be warmer, some more furniture and accessories and it would be perfect. I also think that there is a secret cave attached to house, just like Wayne Manor and The Bat Cave.

I have probably passed this house at least 100 times over the past year, and I have seen it from the 5th ring road as it is getting built, always when on the way to the Avenues. To my surprise I find that the house is featured in a lot of architectural design sites and blogs, I saw and said to myself I knew that house only to read that it is in Kuwait. At first I thought it was three houses but turned out to be six houses molded together, you cant tell when one house starts and the other ends. I always liked the design of the house and wish more houses took this approach to the land they had instead of building the square blocks that they currently are building in most areas in Kuwait.

The project has been complete by AGI Architects who work in Kuwait and Spain, they really seemed to have worked on it to make these houses into the form that they are, with the combination of the white and black colors they merged the six houses on the three plots into overlapping volumes. From the pictures the house seems to have a lot of natural lighting and have been designed in a way to provide each home with its privacy yet seem as one unit, I love the underground parking I just hope it has more then two spots per garage. I’m not even sure how one person can reach the other garage but it is quite a lovely home.

The house is located in Las Rozas, one of the wealthiest towns of Madrid. The dwelling’s plot has a surface of 1.368m2 with a light slope that A-cero has used in order to adapt the building’s three floors: basement, ground floor and first floor. The building’s surface is 762,47m2.

Now this is one very fresh house, its like a breath of fresh air when you look at it. I love looking at houses which are different and refreshing. This house has a very fresh exterior with a lovely pool out front, which looks amazing at night. I always think that to bring out the building you have to know how to subtly light it up to bring out the amazing architecture and I think they have done an amazing job with the house. I think the interior needs some more color to bring the life out even though I like white but it needs more warmth but the exterior is just amazing.

It takes a unique type of architect to meld concrete and green together to look as good as this amazing house. They have taken to meld the two themes together with greenery all over the place, but still looks like some sort of ultra modern bunker. With the right type of lighting you can do wonders and they have with this concrete structure. And what I love about the house is that it does have an underground garage, I see that as a must in any home, so you can protect your vehicles from the harshness of the outdoors.

This is built over 1600 square meter piece of land which is a substantial amount of area to work with. It honestly looks more like a gallery then a home, it looks as if it is meant to cater to large amounts of people to view art work. I do love the cinema they have, great size screen with comfortable seating, and the library is very fun. I just hope they have elevators as the stairs seem a bit steep and not child friendly. The one major thing this house is missing is color, I like the ultra modern design but something needs to warm it up a bit. You need some color to bring in the warmth of a house, I’m a firm believer that the internal of the house can relate to the exterior of the house but shouldn’t be limited to it, this house feels too cold and grey on the inside. I still find it amazing.

Moleskines have gotten more and more popular over the years, the perfect writing pad that everyone enjoys to use. I for one have quite a few, one or two for work, and about a dozen I use for personal stuff from sketching to notes, to remembering events and doodling all kinds of things. I always wondered what kind of environment they worked in to create such amazing products that people love, and now thanks to Visual Therapy I got to see the haloed offices of Moleskine in Milan. You get a sense of how the notebooks are produced, a glimpse of their design studio, and a really big notepad that I would love to have.

I probably have close to 20 Moleskines unopened sitting on my top shelf in my room. Some are plain paper, some are squared, some just lines, and then there are the different sizes. I just can’t get enough of them, a few months ago I found which are A4 size, Moleskine drawing notebook, usually they are half the size. You can never have too many Moleskines, and I will probably pick up more when I see them.

A work of art made by Guz Architects in Singapore, an amazing water front property that incorporates the environment into the design of the house. An amazing landscape for a solar powered house, it has a very fresh and open feel to it. From every room you have an amazing view of the sea, every room looks spacious but I think they need just a little bit more funiture.

I like how they have made a cozy media room in the basement surrounded by the pool in a U-shaped form, but I wonder about the acoustics of the room that has three walls of glass. And I like how they have a lot of fun outdoor areas, the covered area on the ground floor, and the fun spot on the roof.

Matt Logue is a photographer who took the “I Am Legend” concept of New York and applied it to Los Angeles. I love the eerie feeling of the photographs, another version of “I Am Legend” or “Resident Evil”, as if there is a monster around the corner and you should be armed to the teeth with weapons. I don’t know how he did it, taking photographs of Los Angeles in this manner is nearly impossible, LA is never empty, unless your a big budget production company and can shutdown half the city for a few hours but this isn’t easy to pull off.